It
was one of the products which was speculated over and over again and at last,
Google made
(Microsoft's nightmare) true by announcing the Google Chrome OS for Netbooks.
Sundar Pichai, VP Product Management and Linus Upson, Engineering Director at
Google but posted a blog entry at Google's official blog where they annouced it
latest project. Google Chrome OS will be an open source, lightweight operating
system that will initially be targeted at Netbooks. Later this year, Google will
open-source its code, and Netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available
for consumers in the second half of 2010. Speed, simplicity and security are the
key aspects of Google Chrome OS. It's designed to be fast and lightweight, to
start up and get you onto the web in a few seconds.

The user interface is minimal to stay out of your way, and most of the user
experience takes place on the web and for sure on Google's services. As Google
did for the Google Chrome browser, the development team is going back to the
basics and completely redesigning the underlying security architecture of the OS
so that users don't have to deal with viruses, malware and security updates. As
it is said: "It should just work."

Google Chrome OS will run on both x86 as well as ARM chips and Google said
that the team is already working with multiple OEMs to bring a number of
Netbooks to market next year. The software architecture is simple - Google
Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel but not on
top of Android. For application developers, the web is the platform. All
web-based applications will automatically work and new applications can be
written using your favorite web technologies. And of course, these apps will run
not only on Google Chrome OS, but on any standards-based browser on Windows, Mac
and Linux thereby giving developers the largest user base of any platform.

Google Chrome OS is a new project, separate from Android. Android was
designed from the beginning to work across a variety of devices from phones to
set-top boxes to Netbooks. Google Chrome OS is being created for people who
spend most of their time on the web, and is being designed to power computers
ranging from small Netbooks to full-size desktop systems. While there are areas
where Google Chrome OS and Android overlap, Google believes choice will drive
innovation for the benefit of everyone, including Google.

Google said: "We hear a lot from our users and their message is clear -
computers need to get better". People want to get to their E-Mail instantly,
without wasting time waiting for their computers to boot and browsers to start
up. They want their computers to always run as fast as when they first bought
them. They want their data to be accessible to them wherever they are and not
have to worry about losing their computer or forgetting to back up files. Even
more importantly, they don't want to spend hours configuring their computers to
work with every new piece of hardware, or have to worry about constant software
updates. "And any time our users have a better computing experience, Google
benefits as well by having happier users who are more likely to spend time on
the Internet".

Google admits that the team has a lot of work to do. But they are excited for
what's to come and hope we are too. More info should be given in the fall.

UPDATE: Google unveiled further information who it is already working
with on the Chrome OS. The technology partners, to design and build the Chrome
OS devices, include Acer, Adobe, ASUS, Freescale, Hewlett Packard, Lenovo,
Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, and Toshiba.